To Be a Global Civilian Power Izumi Ohno
3. Responses of Major Donor Countries
enlightened self-interest” and sets out a policy for Japan of making an international contribution in a world of interdependenceviii. This report is commendable in that it lays out specific measures such as expanding support for NGOs, collaboration with private companies (in relation to growth strategies), giving consideration to foreign currency-denominated loans, etc. However, concerning the promotion of cooperation across the government and between the public/private actors and the narrowing of priority issues (poverty reduction, investment in peace building and backing sustainable economic growth), a more in-depth approach will probably be required in the future.
It seems appropriate that the report upholds “the promotion of enlightened self-interest” as a post-Cold War vision, but it is also essential that we think about “Japan in a global context,” raise discussion within Japan concerning what the international contribution is really for, and communicate this message clearly. While on the one hand the barriers between external and domestic policies have been lowered by globalization, on the other hand the nation’s inward-looking tendency has strengthened due to the influence of economic stagnation, tight budgets and others, and public awareness toward external policy has dimmed as a result. The question is being raised as to what the nature is of Japan’s core national strategy and vision in the context of the development cooperation Japan provides that corresponds to the US National Security Strategy or the UK’s International Development Act (which aims at the MDG achievement), which I will talk about in the next section.
previous administration of President George W. Bush, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, development was positioned as one of the 3Ds (Defense, Diplomacy, Development) as a means toward solving the problem of poverty, which was considered to be “a breeding ground for terrorism.” But in reality, development held a position subordinate to that of national defense. Although the foreign aid budget was increased significantly, the increased amounts were used for newly established organizations and programs such as the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), and also for aid provided through the Department of Defense. This has tended to weaken the position of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which has been the core US government aid-implementing organization since 1961. In the latter half of the Bush Administration, there was a rising concern over the fragmentation and militarization of aid, leading to active discussions about aid reform and proposals put forward by bipartisan Congress members and think tanks.
In a departure from the Bush Administration’s stress on hard power for “the fight against terrorism,” the new National Security Strategy announced by the administration of Barack Obama in May 2010 was based on a vision with the emphasis on smart power, which combines hard and soft power. This strategy also positions development as an important element of soft power. In order to materialize the new vision in a development context, President Obama called for a White House-led survey in September 2009, and the completion of the survey was followed by an approximately one-year process of analysis, consultation and drafting, which resulted in the formulation of the Presidential Policy Directive (PPD) on Global Developmentx. President Obama himself announced the new directive in September 2010 on the occasion of the UN’s 2010 MDG Summit.
As the first ever US presidential directive concerning development, this PPD showcases the Obama Administration’s global development policy vision and principles. It places the central focus on development, not on aid, and it has the following features: (1) making “broad-based economic growth” its top target; (2) employing a whole of the government approach; (3) “selection and concentration” for setting out strategic issues (food security, global health, climate change); (4) cooperating with diverse partners and consideration toward principles for improving aid effectiveness; and (5) mobilizing private funds to solve development problems and making use of innovative technology. The reason why this directive makes “broad-based economic growth” its top priority is based on the idea that increasing the number of capable partners over the medium and long term will be desirable in light of sustainability. This will help prevent the creation of fragile
states and lead to a more peaceful, stable and prosperous world, and eventually to the spread of market economies and democracy, which are the stated aims of the US. It can be said that the PPD’s positioning of development as a future investment for preventing the creation of fragile states represents a major turnaround from the confrontational approaches promoted by the previous administration such as “the fight against terrorism.” Moreover, the clear intention to position development from a national strategy standpoint that takes in trade, investment and national defense is evident from, for example, the fact that the head of USAID is permitted to participate in meetings of the National Security Council (NSC) according to necessity. In order to take a whole of the government approach, an Interagency Policy Committee on Global Development was established at the end of September 2010 with the NSC’s senior director for development and senior advisor to President Obama as its chair. The committee began its studies from the standpoint of how to reflect the goals of the PPD in the policies and practices of different organizations and to institutionalize them. Meetings are held weekly with the participation of 16 government-affiliated organizationsxi.
In parallel, from July 2009, the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDRxii) was started up under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and issued its final report, entitled “Leading Through Civilian Power,” in December 2010. This was the first QDDR produced by the US State Department. Based on the Obama Administration’s National Security Strategy, the QDDR positions development as an important element of civilian power and sets out the policy under which the State Department and USAID will work together to promote “development diplomacy.” This is intended to stem the amount of aid provided via the Defense Department and thereby to elevate the position of USAID that was weakened under the previous administration.
However, many involved parties doubt the feasibility of this approach, even though they highly value the Global Development Policy of the Obama Administrationxiii. The biggest reason for this is that the Republican Party’s gaining of a majority in the House of Representatives in the midterm elections that took place in November of last year has made it increasingly difficult for the Obama Administration to control Congress. In a situation in which it is highly probable that the aid budget will be reduced due to the Republican Party’s skeptical attitude toward foreign aid, it will not be easy to approach strategic issues based on “selection and concentration” as was set out in the PPD.
There remains a great deal of uncertainty as to how much of the aid budget, which tends to be rigid due to Congressional earmarking, can be reallocated from a “selection and concentration”
viewpoint.
(2) The United Kingdom
It is a characteristic of the UK that, unlike the US, it separates diplomacy from commercial interests and development and brings “the global interest” to the fore. In particular, the Labour Party administration that came into office in 1997 newly established the Department for International Development (DFID), which is charged with policy planning and implementation concerning international development in an integrated fashion. The DFID’s overarching goals are reducing poverty and achieving the MDGs, as specified in the International Development Act, which came into force in 2002.
Based on the UK government’s new public management initiative, all departments including the DFID conclude 3-year public service agreements with the Treasury. For the DFID, a performance evaluation is carried out based on the progress made toward achieving the MDGs, and this exerts an influence on the DFID’s budget allocation, among others. Accordingly, the DFID allocates 90%
of its bilateral aid to the poorest countries, while addressing the issues of poverty in middle-income countries and global issues, etc., through multilateral aid. At the same time, the UK aims to promote collective and effective activities by all donors as a catalyst, not by taking independent action but by appealing to the international community. This is the reason why the DFID takes a lead in promoting in-country policy dialogues and aid partnership, and involves itself actively in the international aid system and the priority strategies of international organizations.
Since the 1960s, the UK, which has two main political parties, has followed a repeated historical pattern in which aid-administering ministries independent of the Foreign Office are set up under Labour administrations while the Foreign and Commonwealth Office organizations are placed in charge of aid implementation under Conservative administrations. However, the present Conservative-LDP coalition, which came into office in May, 2010, has decided to keep the UK’s international development policy independent of its diplomacy. This is a new departure for an administration with Conservative involvement. The Coalition Agreement advocates support for achieving the MDGs and for the observance of the UK’s pledge to the international community (to increase its ODA budget to 0.7% of gross national income (GNI) by 2013), as well as for the firm maintenance of untied aid and the continuance of the DFID. At the same time, regarding the details of the UK’s international development policy, the coalition has consciously set out its differences from the previous administration by, for example, placing stress on the transparency and performance of aid, strengthening accountability to taxpayers and promotion of development in the developing countries not only through aid but also through trade, etc.
It is noteworthy that the Conservative Party, which has traditionally taken a skeptical stance toward aid, is maintaining the DFID and has set out a policy of protecting the ODA budget even during a period of tight fiscal restraint. Since its establishment, the DFID has built up a good reputation within the international aid community for being consistent in terms of policy and implementation as well as for the strength of its international communication powerxiv. So, I expect that the coalition government has also recognized that the DFID’s performance in leading the global rule-making effort in this field has enhanced the presence for the UK in the international community. Moreover, it appears that because there are large numbers of immigrants from Africa and South Asia residing in the UK, the environment of the country makes it relatively easy for the government to obtain public support by displaying British leadership in the international community in the shape of highlighting the “global interests” of poverty reduction and the achievement of the MDGs.
With what kind of system, then, has the UK established in order to respond to global issues? In the UK, the DFID takes the lead in adjusting the response of other government departments as a control tower that directs international development policy. Concerning inter-departmental and cross-cutting development issues, there is a system centered on the DFID under which cooperation units are established with other government departments for specific issues. For example, in the field of trade policy, the DFID cooperates with the Department for Business Enterprise &
Regulatory Reform through a Joint Trade Policy Unit, while in support of peace-building efforts, a Post-Conflict and Reconstruction Unit is established in cooperation with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department of Defence. In addition to making political appeals to international organizations concerning its themes of interest, the DFID also launches initiatives around which it builds multi-donor frameworks and urges the other approving donors to commit to funding them (examples include global health, privately financed infrastructure, BOP (Base of the Economic Pyramid) business support). In this way, although its philosophy and domestic system differ from those of the US, the UK uses development as a pillar for promoting soft power diplomacy.
(3) South Korea
South Korea joined the OECD’s DAC in January 2010 and hosted the G20 Summit in Seoul in November of the same year. Plans are currently under way to hold the DAC-sponsored Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (HLF-4) in Busan in November 2011. South Korea is
working hard to quantitatively expand its ODA budget, but over and above that, as an emerging donor it is aiming to function as a “bridge” between the developing countries and the traditional donor countries by proceeding to systematize its own development experience and sharing this with the developing countries.
At present, South Korea’s annual ODA outlay including both bilateral and multilateral aid totals approximately US$800 million (as of 2008, net expenditure amount base) and its ODA/GNI ratio is 0.09%. The South Korean government is aiming to triple the size of its ODA budget from the 2008 base by 2015 and raise the ODA/GNI ratio to 0.25% (in 2009, Japan’s ODA/GNI ratio was 0.22%).
President Lee Myung-bak himself has announced that through international cooperation, South Korea will become a “guiding light” for the developing countries in the 21st century. The present administration is positioning ODA as its main tool for raising South Korea’s soft power and brand power, and at the G20 Summit, it achieved leadership in getting development included on the G20’s discussion agenda, which has traditionally been centered on finance. As a result of the South Korean effort, the participating countries achieved agreement on the G20 Seoul Development Consensus for Shared Growth and the G20 Multi-Year Action Plan on Development.
South Korea’s development “miracle” is gathering strong interest and respect from many developing countries. Making use of its advantage in having had a comparatively recent development experience, the South Korean government has in recent years launched the Knowledge Sharing Program (KSP) and set forth a policy of systematizing its development experience and actively using this in policy dialogues with developing countries. Even if it can succeed in tripling its ODA budget, South Korea will remain a small donor in terms of total aid amount, but through the KSP this strategy will raise its national brand power and appeal the country’s intellectual contribution to the international community. Japan too has carried out intellectual cooperation in a variety of forms (including policy dialogues, formalization of sector and regional development plans, joint research, seminars, lectures, training visits and others) with many developing countries. However, these activities have tended to be centered on efforts made by the individual departments of various organizations and JICA, and have not involved an approach by the entire nation acting in concert as in the case of South Korea.
Efforts are beginning to be made toward strengthening the ODA policy decision mechanism, In January 2010, South Korea enacted the International Development Cooperation Basic Law, which specified the philosophy, purpose and principles of development cooperation. (This law entered into force in June of the same year.) South Korea’s aid system is modeled on the Japanese system.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MOFAT) and the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) are in charge of grant assistance cooperation and technological cooperation, while the Ministry of Strategy and Finance (MOSF) and the Economic Development Cooperation Fund (EDCF) of the Export-Import Bank of Korea are in charge of loan assistance cooperation. In order to conduct policy coordination between multiple government agencies and organizations, the International Development Cooperation Committee was established in 2006 as a forum for discussing ODA policy under the chairpersonship of the Prime Minister. This committee has 25 members (in addition to 6 or 7 private committee members, the ministers of related agencies participate) and meets twice each year to engage in deliberations on the main directions of ODA policy such as the countries and fields of focus, the ratio of concessional loans against grants and so on.